Inactivity

Good morning Gents,

Thought I'd start a bit of a discussion going after all that's been said about "that event" last week.

The thing I want to ask about is inactivity in boxing. It seems shameful to me that we're living in an age where our top boxers fight 2 times a year. I saw the announcement of Pacquiao vs Bradley being made for June 9th. Doesn't that seem strange, given that its only coming to the end of February? Thats just over 3 months until the fight - which is fine and dandy but the last time Pacquiao fought was in December. Meaning thats almost 6 months between fights.

Personally I feel this inactivity is harming boxing, its happening too often - in some cases only ONE fight a year. I'd like to see at least 3 fights per year as an average. They should incorporate that into being able to have a boxing license.

Thoughts?

I am a firm believer that modern fighters fight too infrequently, whilst I don't like it for the top guys for guys like Mayweather and Manny who earn such stratospheric amounts it is perhaps understandable because they don't particularly need to fight too often and it probably does not make much sense from the perspective of tax to fight too often.

However where I do get extremely wound up is when you see prospects fighting three times a year, given prospects are matched fairly cauitously to begin with I can see no reason they should not be fighting for me at least six or seven times a year and if I'm honest I would be comfortable with more often than that. Appreciate they are not inactive in between fights and are probably still ticking over in the gym but there is no replacement for actual action in a competitive fight.

I suppose it could be said that inactivity can be forced due to health and safety, namely trainers becoming more conscious that boxing at the highest level is now a sustainable career over a real hunger to be the best in the world. Realistically, its a lot to do with the Sanctioning bodies. You look at the WBA listings for their weight classes and more often than not, its vastly different to the WBC/IBF etc.

I understand the sanctioning bodies, but they should have a system where they actually talk to each other. It'd mean there were fewer fights for the top guys to get to BE champion and therefore the process to get there would become a lot more urgent. Look at (no jokes :P) Kell Brook. He's only fighting 2 or 3 times a year. Its not enough. He should be facing 5,6 or 7 people based on his performances. He's not going through wars. By now he should have had a title fight. He should have had enough fights to warrant it. He's sadly not.

For top level fighters, 3 times a year would seem about right for me. They dont need to fight more than that. And the benefits of having reasonable rest periods and being able to have 6-8 week training camps which can be tweaked to suit the opponent in question probably outweights the having to fight for often. It also gives a decent amount of time to promote a fight.

Lower levels or prospects I think it depends. I dont really see a huge amount of tangible benefit from a learning point of view if they are being matched against weak and seriously overmatched opposition. How much did Price learn against McDermott for example? (although at least on paper it didnt appear to be quite as poor a match I suppose). He probably got more excercise during his ring walk. If the sparring is good and competitive then I think thats going to be more beneficial than just picking up a win over a journeyman. But I suppose thats really more a complaint about matching rather than activity. Somebody like Price could easily be out 5/6 times a year and be matched on the basis of how tough his fight was. As I say he could asily have fought again a few days later in theory such was the ease of his win over McDermott. But nowadays you have to accept that small hall shows are not going to be as commonplace and finding billings and cards for low level fighters to compete on is more difficult.

I agree with all the points mades made above.

I mentioned the Price situation a few weeks ago and think that its shocking that in the last 3 years he has only fought for 1 hour and 42 mins or there abouts.

Considering his last handful of fights he has barely broke a sweat, there is no reason at all why he can't be back out in 4-6 weeks as his fitness level is still there. Even if he can't find decent opponents, he can still beef up his record to a reasonable figure which will see him get noticed more. If he has a record of 20-25 wins without defeat, surely he will have to be pitched against better standard of opponants and would have a healthy ranking as well as a shout for recognised belts.

I don't think Maloney is capable these days of taking Price to the top. His shows are too low key.

Its a case of the TV channels too. They don't want to pay for programming that won't be of interest, and thats where the money comes from. You'll find the majority of promoters wait as long as possible to get as much money as possible.

I can honestly see Pacquiao vs Mayweather being bigger than the Superbowl. The advertising space before/after the fight, especially before will be insane. If that fight is signed - I'll guarantee its 7 or 8 months in advance so all of that can be sorted.

I think its also to do with promoting big fights as well. As Bob Arum says 'We can't promote the Pacquiao vs Mayweather' fight in 2 months....

That fight promotes itself....

On the subject of inactivity, the heavyweight champion of the world is due to fight for the third time in as many weeks this coming weekend, call that inactive?